Now the 2024-2025 College Swim Season is Officially Done
A Recap of the DI Men’s and Women’s Swimming NCAA Championship Meets
And what a season it was. Over the last two weeks of March, the fastest college swimmers in the country competed in the pool in Federal Way, Washington and boy was it speedy. We saw 12 national records broken and it is truly incredible to see the level college swimming is at. I am definitely feeling bittersweet that this 2024-25 college swim season is over. But before we get sad, let’s dive into the highlights from the Division I Men’s and Women’s NCAA Championship meets.
UVA Women, Texas Men On Top
Two powerhouses staked their claims over college swimming, but the men’s and women’s stories were a little different for each side. On the women’s side, the result was never really in doubt. The University of Virginia women won their fifth straight national title, becoming the third program in women’s swimming history (joining Texas and Stanford) to achieve such a feat. In the end, the top five were as follows, with Virginia winning decisively:
Virginia – 544
Stanford – 417
Texas – 394
Indiana – 312
Tennessee – 298
Virginia will lose both Walsh sisters next year who were huge point-scorers for the Cavaliers so head coach Todd Desorbo will have his work cut out for him if he wants to make it six in a row.
As for the men, while Texas is a historical powerhouse, they hadn’t won since 2021 so they were ecstatic to bring that trophy back to Austin. It was really always going to be between Texas and Cal, and it was close every day of the meet. However, in the end all Texas had to do in the final event — 400 free relay — was not get disqualified and they would win the meet. Cal did massively out-perform their projected scores, but Texas had the lead after every single day. Top five final scores are below:
Texas – 490
California – 471
Indiana – 459
Florida – 315
Tennessee – 266.5
That covers two of my storylines from my preview post. Virginia did in fact get the five-peat done and Bob Bowman became the first coach in NCAA swimming history to win back-to-back national titles with two different schools. Although he had a lot of talent already at Texas and brought some stars from ASU with him, this is still a super impressive feat. So how did my other storylines play out?
National Records Falling All Around
I thought five individual records on the men’s side and three on the women’s side — in addition to ones that had already been broken this year — looked particularly vulnerable. Those were for the men: 50 free, 100 free, 200 free, 100 fly, and 200 backstroke. And for the women: 50 free, 100 free, and 200 fly. Those predictions proved pretty good! On the men’s side, we saw the following records broken:
100 freestyle: Jordan Crooks, Tennessee, 39.83
200 freestyle: Luke Hobson, Texas, 1:28.33
100 backstroke: Hubi Kos, Texas, 43.20
200 backstroke: Hubi Kos, Texas, 1:34.21 (broke record by over a second)
200 fly: Luca Urlando, Georgia, 1:36.43
800 freestyle relay: Cal, 5:59.75 (broke record by almost three seconds)
400 freestyle relay: Tennessee, 2:42.30
Notably, Jordan Crooks broke one of legendary Caeleb Dressel’s records with that 100 freestyle, though Dressel’s records in the 50 free and 100 fly live to see another season. Josh Liendo also became only the third man in history to break 40.0 seconds in the 100 free, though he didn’t quite break the record Crooks set in prelims (Liendo swam a 39.99 to win the event during finals). That 800 freestyle relay by Cal also deserves an extra shoutout for demolishing the previous record and becoming the first team in history to break the 6:00 barrier in that race.
On the women’s side, we also saw many records fall and a common theme was the name Gretchen Walsh. Records broken were:
100 fly: Gretchen Walsh, Virginia, 46.97
100 free: Gretchen Walsh, Virginia, 44.71
200 backstroke: Claire Curzan, Virginia, 1:46.82
200 fly: Emma Sticklen, Texas, 1:49.11
200 medley relay: Virginia, 1:31.10
Walsh was part of that medley relay record so she was part of ⅗ of the national records broken at the meet. She also tied her national record in the 50 free leading off the 200 freestyle relay. Safe to say she was on fire at this meet. All of her swims are incredible, but that 46.97 100 fly is the highlight. Last year, she became the first (and only) woman to ever go under 48 seconds in that event. Now she is the first to go under 47. She actually broke that record twice in this meet, first going a 47.21 in prelims before breaking that record again in finals.
Emma Sticklen also gets an extra shoutout because she missed breaking that 200 fly record by just 0.01 seconds at the SEC Championship Meet just a few weeks earlier so it was only fitting she break it here, beating out previous NCAA record-holder Alex Walsh en route to winning the national title.
Alex Walsh Also Makes History
Speaking of Alex, Gretchen’s older sister may not have broken as many national records as Gretchen, but she made her own history at this meet. She won the 100 breaststroke on day 3, which means she has won NCAA titles in five different events over her college career. That range is incredible and makes her only the second swimmer in NCAA history to win NCAA titles in five different events. (The other is Tracy Caulkins from the 1980s.)
Bob Bowman Isn’t the Only Repeat Champion At a New School
Distance specialist Zalan Sarkany won the 1,650 freestyle on the final night of the meet. He was all the way out in lane 8, meaning he was the slowest seed in his heat, but he went out hard and never looked back. He won last year too, but last year he was part of the ASU national title-winning team. After Bowman left ASU, Zarkany transferred to Indiana and it is clearly working for him as this time marked a personal best and beat his 2024 winning time by over nine seconds.
How Did Our D3 Boys Do?
There were two Division III transfers competing at the 2025 DI NCAA Men’s Championship meet: Jack Wadsworth with ASU and Frank Applebaum at Cal. Wadsworth competed in the 100 backstroke, where he finished in 18th place. Applebaum competed in the 200 fly, where he finished in 15th meaning he swam in finals, scored points, and is now an All-American in both Division I and Division III!
Well my friends, thank you for following along throughout this college swimming championship season. I hope you have enjoyed these recaps and if you have, please share this with a friend :) More to come!